I run Xfce4 in Ubuntu 9.10 on an old Fujitsu Lifebook. I originally installed Xubuntu, but it was painfully slow. Ubuntu forum posters suggested too much Gnome had crept in for Xubuntu to be truly light weight, and for my low end hardware I'd do better to install Ubuntu from the MinimalCD to get a bare bones system, then install Xfce4 and other things from the command line via apt-get. I did, and it's much peppier, but there's an annoying quirk I haven't solved yet.

Xfce4 installed this way errors out when I try to run Synaptic, because I'm not root. The Xubuntu install apparently used gksudo to run Synaptic, and would prompt for my PW first. Xubuntu installed from apt-get doesn't do that, and the only way I've found to run Synaptic is "sudo synaptic" in a terminal window to enter a PW and spawn Synaptic as a GUI app. I'd love to modify the Xfce menu to change that, but I can't find where it's defined.

I've done a forum search on editing Xfce menus, but I'm either blind or this particular question isn't really answered. Does anyone know where Xfce keeps that particular menu so I can find and tweak it?

Apologies if this question has been answered elsewhere and I'm just missing it.

Xfce4 installed this way errors out when I try to run Synaptic, because I'm not root. The Xubuntu install apparently used gksudo to run Synaptic, and would prompt for my PW first. Xubuntu installed from apt-get doesn't do that, and the only way I've found to run Synaptic is "sudo synaptic" in a terminal window to enter a PW and spawn Synaptic as a GUI app. I'd love to modify the Xfce menu to change that, but I can't find where it's defined.

Never mind. Poking around some more, it turned out I had to use xauth to create a .Xauthority file. Omce that existed, things behaved as desired.______Dennis

You can actually rid yourself of all the gnome and kde dependencies without a new install:

# apt-get remove "libgnome*"
# apt-get remove "libqt*"

This will actually remove gksu and synaptic too, but from there you can install whatever you need when the need arises.With low spec hardware, I found it rather convenient to watch for the "260000 files and folders installed" message and trim down root dependencies until they reach about 130000. Headless systems can be functional even below 100000.

You can actually rid yourself of all the gnome and kde dependencies without a new install:

# apt-get remove "libgnome*"
# apt-get remove "libqt*"

This will actually remove gksu and synaptic too, but from there you can install whatever you need when the need arises.With low spec hardware, I found it rather convenient to watch for the "260000 files and folders installed" message and trim down root dependencies until they reach about 130000. Headless systems can be functional even below 100000.

Also have a look at the deborphan and localepurge packages.

Noted for future reference, and thanks. But I already did a wipe and clean install from MinimalCD, then added Xfce and preferred apps via apt-get. It's still not what I'd call fast, but is usable.______Dennis